He reached the rocks with the pack close on his heels, and then seeing that he could not scale the rocks, the huge creature upreared himself against the boulders and prepared to battle for his life.
With a yelp the leader of the pack flung himself at the great hairy animal’s throat. With one glancing sweep of his huge paw the bear disposed of him. One after another the wolves attacked their foe, only to be felled, wounded and bleeding, and to become victims to their own hunting mates.
“Good boy!” Sandy found himself saying. “Hit ’em again!”
His sympathies were all with the bear, making the fight of his life.
The wolves fell back. But the bear was not deceived. He maintained his stand against the rocks. The wolves crouched, glaring hatred and defiance at him. The ground about the battlefield was red now. Ten wolves had given up their lives. But the bear, too, showed marks of the combat. More than one pair of gleaming white fangs had met in his skin.
Sandy watched with the interest of someone who has a personal stake in a battle royal.
The wolves did not long remain quiescent This time they tried new tactics. They attacked en masse. Like a swarm of bees they flung themselves on the great monarch of the northern forests. His steel-shod paws swept right and left. Yelping and howling the wolves fell before him. But as fast as some fell, others took their places.
The bear was bleeding now. Wounded in a score of places, he fought on against his overwhelming foes with royal courage. To the boy watching from the rocks above, there was something almost sublime in the fight for life that the great creature was making against such overwhelming odds. But plainly the contest could not last much longer.
Like great waves of gray the wolves were hurling themselves forward. They fought blindly and desperately and the bear’s blows were growing weaker.
“I’ll help you, old fellow!” breathed Sandy. “I’ll take a hand in this myself. I’ve no more reason to love your enemies than you have.”